2019-09-04 The Hollywood Reporter

Film

Reviews

It wouldn’t be wrong to call Waves a “teen
drama,” but that label doesn’t begin to convey
the emotional scope of this tender, bruis-
ing, exuberant film. With his third feature,
writer-director Trey Edward Shults continues
his deep dive into the dynamics of family, an
exploration that began with 2015’s character
study Krisha and then was distilled through a
dark genre prism in It Comes at Night.
The film is split into clearly defined halves;
the dividing point between the two chapters
is a calamitous event. The connective tissue
between the two protagonists is that they’re
siblings — a strutting high school athlete (an
extraordinary Kelvin Harrison Jr.) and his

Wa ve s

Sterling K. Brown and Lucas Hedges
co-star in Trey Edward Shults’
heartrending and ecstatic drama
about a Florida family By Sheri Linden

introspective younger sister, the soul of the

story (Taylor Russell, the film’s revelation).

In collaboration with DP Drew Daniels,

Shults creates a sensuous vocabulary from the

movie’s South Florida setting. Deepening the

film’s language is the inventive nuance of the

score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, while

a soundtrack of vintage and contemporary

songs drives the twinned narratives, lending

some sequences a modern operatic sensibility.

Tyler (Harrison) and Emily (Russell) coexist

with their parents in a spacious suburban

house. The movie’s first section is the former’s

story, told with an explosive energy that barely

lets up — until, in a devastating moment, the

world drops away, silent and cold.

Tyler, a star wrestler and student, and his

girlfriend, Alexis (Alexa Demie), are mutually

infatuated. But Tyler faces constant judg-

ment and pressure from his humorless father,

Ronald (Sterling K. Brown, striking unex-

pected notes of ferocity). Stepmom Catherine

(Renée Elise Goldsberry) dishes out tough love

OPENS Friday, Nov. 1 (A24)

CAST Kelvin Harrison Jr., Sterling K. Brown, Lucas Hedges

DIRECTOR Trey Edward Shults, 135 minutes

as much as Ronald, but always with an eye

toward smoothing things over. Matters of race

for this family are woven into the narrative

both subtly and with harsh directness.

Tyler finds his identity stripped away by a

sidelining injury, sending him into a numbing

stew of opioids, weed and booze. His downfall,

when it happens, is horrendous.

Amid the aftermath, Emily and fellow

student Luke (a persuasive Lucas Hedges) get

to know each other. From their awkward flir-

tation at school to the life-changing road trip

that they share, we watch their love blossom.

It’s in the way Shults opens up Waves in this

second half that the wisdom of the movie’s

structure becomes luminously clear. The

shift to a calmer, slower pace signals the

impulse toward healing in Emily’s side of the

narrative. It’s a hard-won healing, a head-on

grappling with grief and guilt, the kind of dif-

ficult work that can only have joy — the belief

in it, the quest for it — at its core.

Telluride

Film

Festival

From left: Kelvin Harrison Jr., Taylor Russell, Sterling K. Brown

and Renée Elise Goldsberry are a Florida family dealing with

the lead-up to and aftermath of shocking trauma.